Dominance and submission - Life on its Ear?
To the outside world, everything about us is upside down. Those of us who live or dabble in the leather life see things differently, do things differently, love differently. We are passionate, curious, and full of energy and life. We take pleasure from a touch of fear and pain. We appear weak when we should be strong yet we are strongest when we appear our weakest. We find freedom in bondage, and independence in being owned. Our Doms appear to be male chauvinists, inappropriately perpetuating the male dominance stereotype, but are often the kindest gentlemen and most attentive and caring partners and lovers. Our submissives appear to be weak dishrags, undermining the hard-won rights of women in society, yet they are some of the most independent and strong-willed women to be found anywhere. To the vanilla world, everything we do is backward, upside-down, and foreign. In short, we scare the Hell out of them.
And yet as much as the vanilla world fears us they are morbidly fascinated with us as well. Perhaps we appeal to some base desire, primal urges that have been buried in the course of upbringing and societal conditioning. Really the only difference between them and us is that we shed our societal skins (some more privately than others) and allow ourselves to feel and revel in the natural urges of childhood and adolescence that we bury in our attempts to fit into the adult world. We go with our gut as it were. We act on our urges and inherent natures with the abandon of a child but with the responsibility of adults. What looks like a carnal machiavellian free for all to the vanilla world is really a very carefully choreographed dance designed to feed our urges and needs while ensuring the safety and respect of those who choose to dance with us. Things are never fully as they appear.
Until recently it was nearly impossible for vanilla folk to look very deeply into the leather world without actually taking a step into it themselves. Sure, there was a little BDSM pornography here and there but it was very difficult to come by. About the only option was to place personal ads or find one’s way to a BDSM club in one of the major metropolitan areas, something few vanilla folks would ever consider. But along comes the Internet and suddenly anyone with a computer or a smart phone can peek behind the curtain and a whole lot more. The trouble is, what they see is often very different from what we do. And the misperceptions developed by pornographic images, videos, and uninformed writing are adopted as gospel by newcomers and wannabes, often to the detriment of themselves, their partners, and the leather community as a whole. Our fearsome and near satanic reputation in the vanilla world is only further cemented by bad actors or misinformed newcomers.
The Internet not only allows vanilla folks to peek behind the curtain, it allows them to pretend to be one of us and part of our community. While we welcome newcomers and often go out of our way to help educate and inform, the Internet allows anyone with an imagination and a minimal ability to communicate in writing to present themselves as a Dom or sub. Of even greater concern, to present themselves as knowledgeable and experienced.
With all the attention brought to BDSM and D/s lifestyles by mainstream entertainment such as the 50 Shades trilogy, people have become more curious than ever before and the curtain is not just being peeked around but is being ripped away. As the glare from the light of the vanilla world grows ever harsher, experienced practitioners of the BDSM lifestyle are shrinking further and further back into the shadows, leaving only the newcomers to talk amongst themselves. The result is a whole new universe of inexperienced and uninitiated people communicating with one another purporting to represent the BDSM lifestyle online who frankly have no experience whatsoever. The free for all is nowhere more apparent than on Tumblr.
Wannabe subs and Doms are everywhere on Tumblr and to some degree this is a wonderful thing because it shows just how interested and curious people really are about BDSM and D/s. And for those who genuinely take the time to seek out good information and become students of the art form, there is a wealth of knowledge here though you have to dig through a lot of bullshit to find it. Those of us who feel ourselves to be part of this lifestyle almost universally consider ourselves to be students of it. We thirst for knowledge and experience. We truly study BDSM, striving to be continually better at our craft. For some, it is almost a full-time occupation. We take this very, very seriously.
People who have never actually experienced the power and majesty of a D/s relationship stick out like a sore thumb to those who have. Take the wannabe Doms for example, the guy who posts captions under every picture on their blog along the lines of “get on your knees and suck my dick slut” and “this is going to hurt but you are going to thank me for it.” Uh, no. No really, that may be your fantasy but that is not how it works and not frankly where the reward lies either. That is the imagery of the Internet pornography talking but has little or nothing to do with actually having a D/s relationship with a living breathing human being. And frankly, it misses the whole point.
What the vanilla world fails to grasp in its shallow pornographic peek into our world is the depth of the relationships that can be built around Dominance and submission. This is not brainwashing or cult activity. This is the bonding of two human hearts and minds in a way that is difficult to describe. While the vanilla wannabe Dom is fantasizing about forcing a sub to do things for him and accept things from him, the genuine and experienced Dom is thinking about how to be worthy of ever greater devotion and a growing desire to please on the part of his submissive. The wannabe wants to force, the Dom wants to entice. A vanilla wannabe is so intent on getting what he wants through force of will that he cannot even conceive of a relationship where a submissive would actually crave dropping to her knees and worshipping him. It is utterly beyond his comprehension. So all he sees in the BDSM pornography is the woman on her knees, bound and cuffed, and he can only assume that she is there against her will or by force of his. He cannot conceive of the sort of relationship where a submissive would actually crave the release of self experienced in submission and have a pervasive and continual desire to want to please her Dom in every possible way. As I said, everything about us is foreign to the vanilla world.
To vanilla folk we appear to objectify one another in a D/s relationship; Doms are totems to be worshipped, subs are objects to be used and discarded. The wannabe Doms and subs act on this belief and can be seen doing so all over Tumblr. Sadly, a lot of people are missing the whole point of D/s in these actions and I perceive are getting pretty emotionally hurt in the process. Far from being objects, genuine Doms and subs are the epicenter of each others’ universe. Doms spend much of their waking hours thinking of how to be more worthy to their submissive, and submissives spend much or their mental energy thinking about how to be more pleasing to their master. This is far from the typical “what’s in it for me” attitude of many vanilla relationships. Indeed, once again it is a polar opposite. D/s is inherently a giving relationship where even the Dom who outwardly appears to be taking all the time is indeed focussed entirely on the needs of his submissive and how he can be ever more worthy of her submission. Indeed, the Dom sheds self nearly as much as the sub does, just in different ways.
So do we turn life on it’s ear here in this D/s lifestyle? Perhaps to the vanilla observer we do, but I would argue quite the opposite. We in the BDSM lifestyle are actually living more authentic lives, in greater harmony with our selves and the needs and desires of our partners, than most vanilla relationships. In many respects I believe that it is society that has turned life on its ear and that we who strive for successful, sensual D/s relationships are actually closer to our true selves and have deeper emotional and physical relations than most in the vanilla world could ever conceive.
So pay attention as you roam around Tumblr and elsewhere, read the words people write and look for the belief structures behind them. If you pay attention you will likely get a good sense of who the person is, whether they really have any concept of D/s and the BDSM lifestyle, and whether they are truly a student of the Dominance and submission craft or just a paragon of bluster and bravado or a desperate craving for acceptance. All are welcome here but sadly not all get it.
So whose life is on its ear? I’ll take mine thanks.
Caption © For The Love of a Submissive, 2012
